The Air Force's 30,000 Pound Bunker-Busting Bomb Is Ready For Action

Its been nearly eight months since the Pentagon sent its largest
and most powerful bomb, the Massive Ordnance Penetrator (MOP),
back
to Boeing for modifications necessary to take out Iranian
nuclear facilities, but the Air Force says it's now ready to go.

Jeff Schogol at Defense News reports that Air Force
Secretary Michael Donley says that while the MOP bomb continues
to be refined and optimized, the Pentagon feels the 30,000 pound
piece of ordnance is now sufficient to strike whatever targets
the military may have in mind.

While the bomb went back to the drawing board with Pentagon
planners considering Iran a potential target, recent developments
in Syria offer up alternate possibilities for the MOP's initial
mission.

Schogol mentions in his piece Defense Department spokesman George
Little who said Tuesday that Syria's stockpile of chemical
weapons are much on the minds of military planners: "I think I've
been very clear," Little said, "as have others in the U.S.
government, that it would be unacceptable not to secure them.”

Securing those weapons could take different forms, from
Jordanian special forces, to Turkish ground troops, to
bombing campaigns. Though traditional bombings could cause the
chemical weapons to be released into the environment, producing
catastrophic effects on the ground.

The Heritage Foundation puts the number of facilities chemical
weapons storage facilities at 50, but with Syria's recent
deployment of the weapons, the number of locations at which the
weapons are stored could change by the day. Most of these
facilities would have to be secured by ground troops to prevent
the chemicals release.

But underground bunkers Syria may have at their disposal are
another story. Independent Media Review & Analysis says
Syria has 30 such bunkers, whether that number is accurate may be
irrelevant, because there's little doubt Assad's regime have them
— and that may be where the MOP bomb comes in.

The MOP's modifications allow it to crash through 60 feet of
reinforced concrete and detonate up to 200 feet below ground,
giving it plenty of earth to cover up the chemical arsenal it's
targeting.

As the Syria situation continues to unfold it'll be interesting
to see how this chemical weapons situation plays out. In the
meantime, the Air Force wants the world to know it's ready to do
its part.